Typical UOJ Argumentation

Knapp would be proud of this comment, but not Luther.

DRB has left a new comment on your post "UOJ Stormtroopers Illustrating How They Get Their ...":

Since the well has been adequately poisoned, there should be no harm in my encouraging anyone confused about this topic to spend time carefully reading the source documents themselves. Here are a few passages from the Scriptures and Lutheran confessions that have been cited in support of the position that God in Christ reconciled (past tense) the world (not just part of the world) to himself, exhorting sinners to be reconciled to him (no Universalism here) -- 2 Cor. 5:19-20. I already pointed out Luther's agreement in a comment on a post from a few days ago.

These LCMS Theses on Justification succinctly distinguish objective justification from subjective justification and give the sedes doctrinae for the good news that God absolved the world by the work of his Son:

'In normal Biblical and ecclesiastical usage the terms "justify" and "justification" refer to the ("subjective") justification of the individual sinner through faith (Rom. 4:5, 5:1, etc.; AC IV, 3; FC SD III, 25). But because theologically justification is the same thing as the forgiveness of sins (Rom. 4:1-8; Ap IV, 76; FC Ep III, 7), it is Biblically and confessionally correct to refer to the great sin-cancelling, atoning work of the Redeemer as the "objective" or "universal" justification of the whole sinful human race. (John 1:29; Rom. 5:6-18; 2 Cor. 5:19; Col 2:14-15; 1 Tim. 3:16; Ap IV, 103-105; LC V, 31, 32, 36, 37; FC SD III, 57)'

That is the position of the Lutheran confessions (e.g., Ap IV, 103-105; FC SD III, 57), not a later development. More important, it is the position of the apostle, as can be seen from 2 Cor. 5:19-20, unless one either follows the Calvinists in changing the meaning of the word "world" or follows the synergists in changing the meaning of the word "reconciled."

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GJ - In a rare departure, the author of this comment has left his name - David R. Bickel. He is apparently this scientist, since the bio links to his religious website.

I am not impressed with the LCMS Theses. I addressed them at length in Thy Strong Word. Someone claimed that Robert Preus was involved in writing them or wrote them. If so, that was at the zenith (or nadir) of Church Growth at his seminary. The two go together. His Justification and Rome teaches the opposite of the comment posted above.

The comment struck me as typical Missouri. As Egbert Schaller wrote, Walther was not a Biblical theologian. He gave Missouri a heritage of propositional theology - offering theses and citing Biblical or Book of Concord sources for them. There is no better way to engage in circular reasoning. Valleskey did the same thing in his odious CG essay in the Wisconsin Schwaermerschrift.

I am glad a scientist is studying theology. I only hope that his investigates more thoroughly. The double-justification scheme is from Knapp, not the Book of Concord.

No one is obliged to believe in the publication of a Midwestern Lutheran sect. As Mudslide wrote in a brilliant essay, Lutherans seem to celebrate Reformation anniversaries with a new travesty. The LCMS justification theses were that.

I prefer the Book of Concord:

"These treasures are offered us by the Holy Ghost in the promise of the holy Gospel; and faith alone is the only means by which we lay hold upon, accept, and apply, and appropriate them to ourselves. This faith is a gift of God, by which we truly learn to know Christ, our Redeemer, in the Word of the Gospel, and trust in Him, that for the sake of His obedience alone we have the forgiveness of sins by grace, are regarded as godly and righteous by God the Father, and are eternally saved." Formula of Concord, Thorough Declaration, III. #10. Of the Righteousness of Faith before God. Concordia Triglotta, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1921, p. 919. Tappert, p. 541. Heiser, p. 250.

More On Leadership

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Leadership Includes the Laity and Pastors":

you wrote
"Someone posted a few comments critical of Synod President Mark Schroeder's leadership of WELS. With the possible exception of Church and Change, most WELS members and pastors are favorably impressed with the SP's performance.
I thought the critical comments missed the mark completely."

Maybe conservatives are critical of Schroeder because they see a person who truly has been given authority but who is not decisive or strong. Do you think it would better to oust the C&C crowd quietly,or do you think it is better to publicly address public error? I vote for the second.

Laypeople (who aren't leaders) are being led astray by them, so wouldn't it be good if they were officially rebuked? That's why I see Schroeder as another game player. And I have not heard any decisive words from the man. Just hints; hints are not good enough when people's souls are on the line.

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GJ - I would like to urge people to use their time and energy constructively. Applying the Word means doing that at every opportunity and never flinching. We do flinch, of course, but we have to return to the battle again and again. Sadly, WELS and Missouri leaders decided that one battle per lifetime was enough. WELS did the split with Missouri, and Missouri kicked some of their liars out. After that, Holy Mother Synod could do no wrong.

I suggest writing SP Schroeder about what he is doing right and wrong, showing your own support for Biblical, Confessional principles.

However, the local congregation and circuit are just as important. I had to force the Columbus circuit to meet, even though regular circuit meetings were required by the constitution. Who was in that circuit? The District VP!

If the circuit meetings do not regularly address doctrinal concerns, the rot will spread quickly, as it has already. Fixing will take as long as the rotting, so get to work. Twenty years ago, only elderly ladies had the spine to contact me and talk about these doctrinal concerns. Now men with young families are actively engaged in these issues.

Martin Chemnitz insisted on regular meetings of his diocese when he was made a bishop. The diocese also insisted on him earning a PhD in theology. His leadership and superb education did not make his life easy. Jack Preus' biography of Chemnitz is good to read in these "last days of an old, insane world."

The Lutheran Church fell into schism when Luther died in 1546. The Book of Concord was published in 1580. Do the math: it took 34 years to repair the damage, and that was done by the greatest theologians of the age - the Concordists. Even then, the struggle continued as men were urged to sign this new confession of faith. Romanticizing the Reformation is dangerous. It was much more dangerous and difficult than today.

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Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "More On Leadership":

We're workin' father, we're working. We just get frustrated.
Your advice is like gold: Write SP Schroeder "about what he's doing right and wrong", I will do that. But my fear is that he's got 1000 emails to read daily, and most of them involving bureaucratic trivialities from people he knows personally. Why would a stranger writing pique his interest?
I want him to be bold (and I have personal connections that tell me he IS the man for the job) but I wonder if the political pressures of his position (being in the WELS) would castrate the strongest of men. We have many examples in history of men being rendered impotent simply because they continue on within the established framework.

Never-the-less I will write Schroeder and encourage him to be fearless.

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GJ - I imagine there are a lot of emails to read. Personal letters can be more effective than emails because they are so rare. Face-to-face comments are worthwhile, too.

More needs to be done at the local level. That may be as basic as getting an adult class going on the Book of Concord, or providing copies of the Book of Concord for the congregation to use. I am not sure which books are in print for studying the Book of Concord. People need to become familiar with the text itself. I used to read the Large Catechism, printed in a solo volume by the ALC, whenever I had the chance.

Since everyone wants a new translation again, why not get a bunch of New KJVs to use in the congregation, along with KJVs? The KJV is the most precise translation and the New KJV is the next best. Why do Lutherans have to settle for the worst? The two are closely related. If a KJV reading seems too opaque, the New KJV will provide the modern words. If the New KJV goes Reformed ("make disciples), the KJV offers the original language.

A lot of dirty tricks are going on in all the synods. ELCA Bishop Kenneth Sauer was no pal of mine, but he was so alienated by the extreme trends in his synod that he now urges people to leave ELCA with their congregations. For a master politician and ELCA loyalist to make such a break is remarkable. But look at how ELCA started - the ex-LCMS liars were given a lot of power. The final meetings to approve the merger were chaired by lawyers who accepted no opposition. Everything was a steamroller. ELCA ACORNed itself. Sauer participated in that debacle and found himself spit out after decades of labor for the liberals.

Jerry Kieschnick is leading Missouri as far away from the Lutheran Confessions as possible. I was predicting years ago that he would shut down Ft. Wayne in the name of merging the schools and saving money. Now they are discussing shutting both schools. Good riddance, I say. Ft. Wayne could keep its charter and land by pretending to be another school for Missouri. It was a Missouri college before it was a seminary. Jack Preus moved people around to scatter the liberals. When he was done, Seminex was a pimple instead of a 400-student school.

Members of WELS are frustrated? I imagine they are. Let me give one little example of how things are handled by apostates. As many readers know, I get raging, insulting anonymous comments on a regular basis, especially when I dare to expose Church and Chicaneries and their heroes. Below is a summary of one incident that I researched from multiple sources and published.

1. Church and Change board member and Perish Services boss Bruce Becker kept angling for another consultant for his empire.
   
2. Due to budget fears, SP Schroeder urged that board not to call another Perish Assistant. If they did, he cautioned them not to hire a polarizing figure.
   
3. The board did not listen to the Synod President, so he stopped meeting with them.
   
4. As the economy went into a five spiral crash, the board went ahead and hired Paul Calvin Kelm, the worst possible candidate. For some reason, St. Mark Willow Creek let him go!
   
5. Calling anyone was one slap in the face. It also burdened the synod with an unnecessary expense. You may recall that no First VP was hired to replace Wayne Mueller, even though Schroeder could have insisted on that and used a friendly face to help him with his work.
   
6. Calling Kelm was another slap in the face.
   
7. The dirtiest trick (almost) was keeping this information from the SP until he read it in the call list.
   
8. Next the Chicaneries insisted that Schroeder knew about the Kelm call. That was tantamount to calling him a liar.
   
9. I knew these facts from various people, who relayed them to me. Finally, I was called a liar for publishing something known around the synod.
   
10. Multiply this many times over, and that has been the experience of SP Schroeder. Every issue of FIC is another ad for Church and Change false doctrine. I imagine that is frustrating too.
    

Many Chicanery leaders are no longer lodged as parasites at The Love Shack. Paul Calvin Kelm will celebrate his 65th birthday by leaving syodical employment. Becker quit soon after hiring Kelm. Wayne Mueller and Kruschel vamoosed earlier. Stroh is leaving. Perish Services has been neutered and subordinated, the perfect end for an insubordinate gang. Eventually a Lutheran approach will emerge, if this trend continues, and faithful workers will feel free to do their jobs according to the Word instead of bowing to Fuller, Willow Creek, and Mars Hill.

In Mark Jeske's eyes, squozen shut, I see the panic of a man running around trying to prop up his empire with more foundation grants and Thrivent loot. That is why he needed Missouri RSO status. Bad news will arrive for at least another year. America has $1 trillion in bad commercial mortgages coming due. Like home mortgages, the bad loans are divided among a zillion investors. Many huge commercial projects are now in foreclosure. Banks are using "extend and pretend" to keep bad loans from becoming liabilities. This latest crisis will hit foundations and insurance companies for some time to come. Schwan is cutting back severely. So is Thrivent.

I expect Jeske to take his Church and Change gang out in the future. It is nothing more than an extension of his maladroit leadership. Several--like Ski, Gunn, and Doebler--are pastors only because of huge subsidies. They may be making tents too - intentional ministry, if you will. Every region seems to have its Church and Change experiment. Why has this happened? The local pastors and members have tolerated the intolerable. All they need to do is confront the miscreants and aim them back to the Word and the Confessions. The extent of the rot must frustrate anyone trying to deal with it. Defunding error is the second step.

UOJ Sermons

One cannot be a Lutheran and an Enthusiast.

People should read a few UOJ sermons to see how absurd they are.

Here is one from Atonement in Plano, Texas.

Pastor Gabb says everyone is forgiven. The statement of beliefs repeats this notion. The inept analogy in the sermon is having money put in the bank account of every single person in the world. S'funny how he misses a good analogy from the Book of Concord and Luther - treasure distributed by the Means of Grace. This congregation is teaching Universalism.

For example, if I told you that I put $25,000 into your bank account, I wouldn’t say, "If you believe I put $25,000 into your bank account, then it’s there. But if you don’t believe it, then it’s not there." Whether the money is in your bank or not is not based on whether you choose to believe it or not. I’ve complet-ed the transaction without your cooperation.

And so Jesus completed the work of salvation without our co-operation. Jesus said to more than one person whom we read about in the Bible, "Your sins are forgiven" (Mt 9.2). He didn’t say to those people, "If you believe that I paid for your sins then I paid for your sins." Justification is complete. You don’t have do anything to complete what Jesus started or cooperate with Jesus in some way to be forgiven.

On the other hand, it’s also true that we are "justified by faith," that is, the forgiveness is yours through faith in Jesus but does not benefit someone who does not believe in Jesus.

The name on the church says Atonement, but the pastor does not understand the Atonement. Texas is like that. Patterson's church is named Holy Word but he is smitten by Enthusiasm.

Here is Pastor Gabb on faith. Like most UOJ advocates, he contradicts his "everyone forgiven" sermon by repeating that people are sinful. Valleskey does the same thing in his wretched Church Growth textbook. Somehow Gabb talked about "Taking Care of Your Faith" without ever mentioning the Means of Grace. That is like talking about getting to the other side of the Mississippi without ever giving directions to the bridge across it.

(V 21-24). The word ‘justify’ means to declare someone inno-cent, not guilty. You are justified, not guilty of sin (Rom 8.33; 2 Cor 5.19). WE ARE JUSTIFIED means there is no charge of sin against us. When someone is accused of a crime and the judge declares that person to be justified, the accused is free to leave the judge’s courtroom, free to walk out the door and the judge will not stop that person and say, "I’m not done with you yet; your trial isn’t over yet." No, the judge is done; the trial is over; there is no crime, no offense. And so it is with God. There is no trial awaiting us because there is no sin that can or should condemn us. We are justified, free to walk out of this life through the door into eternal life in heaven.

Pastor Gabb worked faith into the sermon, but in the context of his UOJ pronouncements, that really meant little. The words in blue, above, are the typical UOJ court language. Everyone in the world was pronounced innocent, the moment Christ died on the cross, or the moment He rose from the dead. Perhaps the next WELS convention will vote on the Moment of Justification. Recently someone wrote me that Jesus declared everyone in the world forgiven the moment He left the tomb. I have not found that anywhere on my Bible software (BibleWorks) and I have the NIV.

Faith is an appendage to Kokomo Justification, because they spend all their time on Universal Justification and cannot reconcile that with the Biblical doctrine. However, they try to weld the two together with disastrous results.

In my experience in reading such material, UOJ has always been accompanied by silence on the efficacy of the Word and almost total neglect of the Means of Grace. The troubles of WELS and the Lutheran Church in general can be attributed to their neglect of this excellent summary statement:

"The doctrine of the means of grace is a peculiar glory of Lutheran theology. To this central teaching it owes its sanity and strong appeal, its freedom from sectarian tendencies and morbid fanaticism, its coherence and practicalness, and its adaptation to men of every race and every degree of culture. The Lutheran Confessions bring out with great clearness the thought of the Reformers upon this subject."

"Grace, Means of," The Concordia Cyclopedia, L. Fuerbringer, Th. Engelder, P. E. Kretzmann, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1927, J-101 p. 299.

Passing Information To Me

Someone asked me about some sermons on justification. One way to be specific while staying under the radar is to send a comment, marked - "Do not post this." I get that in my email right away. I do not know who sends comments unless they identify themselves. I reject the comment and no one else can read it.

Therefore, answering the question asked in a recent comment, I do need more information.

Fifty Congregations Have Already Voted To Leave ELCA

ELCA NEWS SERVICE
October 29, 2009

Some ELCA Congregations Vote to Leave or Redirect Funds, Find It's Not Easy
09-241-JB
  
CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Throughout the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), leaders and members have responded in a variety of ways to changes in the church's ministry polices, a decision made by voting members of the 2009 Churchwide Assembly. Some members agreed with the decision. Some were opposed. Some weren't sure how to react.
 
Since the assembly, some ELCA congregations have taken votes to leave the denomination or redirect funds away from the ELCA. Leaders and members in a few such congregations report it's not always easy to make such choices, and there can be unintended consequences.
 
The 2009 assembly, which met Aug. 17-23 in Minneapolis, adopted proposals to change ELCA ministry policies. One change makes it possible for Lutherans in publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous same-gender relationships to serve as ELCA associates in ministry, clergy, deaconesses and diaconal ministers.
 
For some ELCA leaders and members, the assembly directive was inconsistent with their understanding of biblical authority. They often repeat the assertion that "the ELCA has left them."
 
The assembly also adopted by exactly a two-thirds majority a social statement on human sexuality. The statement addressed a wide range of matters related to human sexuality, but a portion of it addressed same-gender relationships, causing disagreement among the voting members.
  
Through Oct. 27, the ELCA Office of the Secretary reports an estimated 50 of the ELCA's 10,396 congregations have taken first votes to leave the denomination or have scheduled them, nearly all because of the assembly's actions on sexuality. Five such votes have failed. The estimate is based on reports from synod bishops, said David D. Swartling, ELCA secretary.


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GJ - ELCA's Gospel Reductionism (everyone is saved) is exactly the same as UOJ, with slightly different wording and identical results. All the Pietistic excuses for The CORE can be used to promote "a ministry to, by, and for homosexuals."